Christopher Kane / Pre-Fall 2014

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Christopher Kane has been revising his science lessons again. This term, he’s turned the page on biology (the chapter that brought out all those prints of botanical fertilization for spring) and started going over molecular structures. That’s why the look of those illustrative colored plastic ball-and-rod models has infiltrated his pre-fall collection, as a print motif, and in a clutch of rather brilliant Swarovski crystal-studded necklaces and bracelets (an A+ for those, Christopher). “I always think there’ll be something scientific in what I do,” he remarked, while showing his line on rails in his studio in Shacklewell Lane in London.

Actually, those rails go on and on these days, and they contain much more than one idea. Now that it’s a year since the designer graduated from the junior league of fashion and joined up with the forces of the Kering Group, there’s a feeling of optimistic expansion around here. Ideas that appeared in earlier collections, and updates on house staples (biker jackets, sweaters) are getting re-aired in new ways, so the whole thing ranges from party dresses with balloony, poufy skirts, to luxurious jackets and coats (emerald-dyed goat fur) through to sweatshirts and T-shirts. Kane-ologists who regret not buying something from his early Crocodile Dundee collection, which featured snakeskin-printed flounced chiffon, will spot their second chance in a sheer biker jacket with a fluttery peplum, while those who missed out on last winter’s “falling-apart” dresses with unraveling panels will spot a reprise of the idea, this time with hefty industrial-weight zippers left sexily half-open. Kane says he saw a lot of girls out and about, loving wearing that whoops-my-legs-are-showing look at parties, so he’s giving them something more to play around in. “I suppose it’s romantic highlights from lots of collections, vamped up.”

Still, as much as Kane is focused on logical commercial expansion and grown-up brand-building, his creative brain can’t help but lead him back to his wide-eyed Scottish childhood memories. Looking through the line at the silk satin dresses—a shade on the eighties disco side—he exclaimed, “ Marie McDonald! My cousin on my father’s side—they thought they were dead posh. She dressed like that when she went out. I don’t know why, but these references always creep up as I’m doing something.”